– The movement over the last two months can be explained almost entirely by a major shift in opinion about same-sex marriage among black voters. Previously 56% said they would vote against the new law with only 39% planning to uphold it. Those numbers have now almost completely flipped, with 55% of African Americans planning to vote for the law and only 36% now opposed.

-The big shift in attitudes toward same-sex marriage among black voters in Maryland is reflective of what’s happening nationally right now. A new ABC/Washington Post poll finds 59% of African Americans across the country supportive of same-sex marriage. A PPP poll in the critical swing state of Pennsylvania last weekend found a shift of 19 points in favor of same-sex marriage among black voters.

While the media has been focused on what impact President Obama’s announcement will have on his own reelection prospects, the more important fallout may be the impact his position is having on public opinion about same-sex marriage itself.

Maryland voters were already prepared to support marriage equality at the polls this fall even before President Obama’s announcement. But now it appears that passage will come by a much stronger margin.

As much as I’m encouraged by how much change President Obama seems to have catalyzed, I’m equally aware that there is much that a mere statement cannot change in a matter of days. Historically black homophobia is one of them, but not for the reasons one might think.

Let me make a few things clear from the start. African-Americans are not “more homophobic” than anyone else; certainly no more homophobic than society at large. African-Americans as a group are not monolithic. There is no monolithic “African-American community,” “African-American family,” or “African-American church” that is representative of all of us. We are as varied and diverse as any other group. Thus, I try not to speak in singular terms about any of the above, but tend to speak in terms of “some African-American communities,” etc.

That said, the reality of homophobia in some African-American communities and institutions is undeniable. The vehemence of that homophobia, where present, has been noted. The history and deep roots of that homophobia is what makes me skeptical about the sudden shift towards support for marriage equality.

Six years ago, I reviewedTheir Own Receive Them Not: African American Lesbians And Gays in Black Churches, by Horace L. Griffin. At the time, I wrote that if I had the resources, I would send a copy of Griffin’s book to every African-American minister in the country. I’d still do so today, if I could. There may not be as much of a need as there, but it certainly couldn’t hurt. If nothing else, those who read it might come away with a little more understanding about the roots and the impact of homophobia in their churches and communities.

Griffin starts by drawing on his own experience to explain the role Black churches, families and communities as “safe havens” for African-Americans, and the contradiction that these “wonderful institutions of support, nurture and uplift” are at the same time “resistant and even closed in treating gay and heterosexual congregants equally or, in many cases offering simple compassion to the suffering of gay people.”

But Griffin’s explanation of how the development of a particular brand of Black Christianity, popular sexual myths about Black people, and the anxiety of a nascent Black middle class combined to produce a virulent strain of homophobia.

From there, Griffin delves into an overview of American religious history that actually parallels with the one in Kevin Phillips’ American Theocracy: The Peril and Politics of Radical Religion, Oil, and Borrowed Money in the 21stCentury, detailing how many African Americans who converted to Christianity during slavery joined conservative denominations that were also big on biblical literalism/inerrancy. (Those Black Christians found ways to ignore or dispense with some biblical passages used to justify slavery, but more about that in a bit.)

What’s most intriguing is Griffin’s suggestion that this particular brand of religion combined with the popular sexual myths about Blacks at that time — that Black men and women were insatiable sexual savages, prone to predation, seduction and violence — and the strict sexual morality of the Victorian era, to produce Black churches and communities that still respond vehemently and even violently to the very concept of homosexuality let alone actual homosexuals in Black churches, families and communities. In fact, is the most cogent explanation I’ve heard yet of a reality that still tends to mystify me.

Following slavery, the racist attitudes that defined black men as sex predators caused black men extreme hardship and death. By appealing to the age-old stereotype that black men harbor an insatiable desire for white women, black men existed as targets for to be blamed for raping white women. Indeed as Paula Giddings notes, it was black women themselves who were identified as culprits for their own rape due to the purported sexual appetite that blacks had for sex. … Given the majority culture’s racism and sexual attitudes, African Americans soon learned that their very survival depended on distancing themselves from “sexual perversions.” Much of black heterosexuals’ anti-homosexual sentiment exists as a means of countering the perception of black sexuality as perverse in order to survive and gain respectability and acceptance by the majority. Thus, it is understandable that African Americans would approach homosexuality with more dread and disdain than others, often denying a black homosexual presence to avoid being further maligned in a racist society.

I’m reminded of my freshman year of college, when I “came out” in a very public way — during a debate with a traveling evangelist, who spent a week haranguing students from the university’s free speech platform. The news reached my hallway in the freshmen dorm long before I made it back at the end of the day.

The Resident Assistant for my hall, who was African-American took me aside when he saw me, to tell me that the news was all over the hall, and to ask if I was OK. I assured him that I was, and his response echoed all that Griffin outlined.

After expressing relief that I was OK (and that I’d come out to my roommate months earlier, and he had “no problems with it”), my R.A. sighed and shook his head. “Man, it’s hard enough being black,” he said, “but to be black and gay? That’s rough.”

Now, I’m not going to argue that Obama’s turnaround alone caused this sea change. The arc of the moral universe has been bending toward justice on gay rights for a long time, and as I wrote last week, the president gave it an additional tug. There have been advocates within the NAACP working to make this happen for a long time, and they deserve a lot of credit. African-American voter opinion had already been trending in this direction, even if black voters had been less receptive to gay marriage than other demographic groups. There is also an emotional and personal component to the president’s stance that makes his moral suasion hard to replicate on behalf of, say, the jobs bill or the public option. (And let’s also remember it’s white voters who are most hostile on some of those economic issues, thanks to the divide and conquer politics of the GOP over the last 40 years.)

Still, it’s hard not to conclude that Obama’s words made a significant difference in the political course of this debate. Ironically, it was once critics of Obama who mocked the power of words, and specifically the candidate’s own oratorical gifts. Obama shot back at them many times.

What happens when a leader of Obama’s stature leads on an issue like this is that it creates space for other leaders to lead, like Rev. Otis Moss III of Trinity United Church of Christ, in Chicago, IL, who used an address to his church to read a letter he sent to a fellow clergyman regarding the president’s support for marriage equality.

That same year, Sharpton explained he was influenced by someone even closer to home: his sister. Sharpton revealed to The Advocate that his sister is a lesbian, and her experience inspired him to launch his initiative.

“My sister is gay. I understood the pain of having to lead a double life in the system [since] we grew up in church. She is gay, and she fought that perception in church while she embraced it in her private life.”

Two years ago, President Barack Obama was not quite ready to say, as he did Wednesday, that he supports same sex marriage, but he conceded at the time that “attitudes evolve, including mine.” In a question and answer session with progressive bloggers in October 2010, Obama was quoted by Americablog’s Joe Sudbay saying “it’s pretty clear where the trendlines are going.”

If the president was thinking of the trends in public opinion polls, his read was dead-on. Surveys by various national media pollsters have shown a consistent, ongoing trend toward support of same-sex marriage, with slightly more Americans offering support than opposition in measurements taken over the past year.

For example, a just completed national Gallup poll fielded May 3-6 shows 50 percent in support of same-sex marriage and 48 percent opposed, slightly down from 53 percent support a year ago. As Gallup explained, the latest result marks “only the second time in Gallup’s history of tracking this question” that support exceeded opposition.

We did that.

Bob Borosage led his post with Martin Luther King’s famous quote: “The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justice.” As I’ve written before, that bend doesn’t just happen. If the arc of the moral universe bends towards justice, it’s because many of us have working hard to bend it in that direction. If the president is lending his hands to that work, even symbolically, I welcome him. There is no such thing as “too little, to late” in that work.

If the president had to take a public position, because public and political pressure forced his hand, it’s because our movement made him do it.

I came to Washington in 1994. It was the year after the Hawaii Supreme Court’s ruling on same-sex marriage launched the issue into the national spotlight, and the conservative right capitalized on the issue, declaring it “a major battleground of the 1990s.” The result was the Defense of Marriage Act, prohibiting the federal government from recognizing same-sex marriages, and absolving states from having to recognize same-sex marriages recognized in other states.

From where I stand, something more interesting is going on. We’ve examined ourselves and found a fundamental weakness: We placed too much hope and faith in the president. It was a mistake, but not because this president has somehow betrayed us. He’s done what presidents do: governed under all the stresses of competing pressures.

It was a mistake because we—not just the president—have to be the agents of change in our society. Electoral victories without sustained movements will never address inequality, poverty, or any of the major issues we face. Abolitionists gave us abolition, not Lincoln. Powerful movements focus on issues, not on presidents. The civil rights movement gave us voting rights for blacks. The suffragette movement gave women the right to vote. The gay rights movement gave gays the right to marry and put an end to “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell.” Union victories created the modern middle class.

Increasingly, those who are engaging in this more interesting conversation are asking: How do we extend our electoral organizing beyond the elections?

This is a far more exciting question because answering it correctly will give us a chance at the real prize: building a society governed by progressive values and policies that move us all forward together.

Evolution, political or otherwise, doesn’t happen overnight. It doesn’t happen in a vacuum. It happens because the environment, political or otherwise, changes in such a way that means survival for those capable of adapting and extinction for those who don’t.

It’s great “when a leader actually leads” as President Obama did on same-sex marriage. But his “evolution” happened because individuals and organizations doing the day-to-day work of building and sustaining a movement changed the political environment. We made it possible, safe, and possibly even advantageous for a sitting president to endorse marriage equality, by changing our families, our communities, and the country. The movement didn’t force the president’s hand. We took the president by the hand, and brought him with us.

Political evolutions of the kind that “move us all forward together,” don’t happen from the top down. That kind of change doesn’t happen “when leaders actually lead.” It happens when leaders are led to lead. Led, that is, by people like you and me.

There’s a lesson for the progressive community in that. It’s something I plan to address in an upcoming post.

Blog Authors

Terrance Heath is the Online Producer at Campaign for America's Future. He has consulted on blogging and social media consultant for a number of organizations and agencies. He is a prominent activist on LGBT and HIV/AIDS issues.

Bill Scher is the Online Campaign Manager at Campaign for America's Future, and the executive editor of LiberalOasis.com. He is the author of Wait! Don't Move To Canada!: A Stay-and-Fight Strategy to Win Back America, a regular contributor to Bloggingheads.tv and host of the LiberalOasis Radio Show weekly podcast. He has opinion articles that have been published by the New York Times, Minneapolis Star Tribune and Omaha World-Herald, and has made appearances on CNN, MSNBC and NPR among other TV and radio outlets.

Dave has more than 20 years of technology industry experience. His earlier career included technical positions, including video game design at Atari and Imagic. He was a pioneer in design and development of productivity and educational applications of personal computers. More recently he helped co-found a company developing desktop systems to validate carbon trading in the US.

Roger Hickey is Co-Director of the Campaign for America’s Future. He was also one of the founders of Health Care for America Now!, a coalition of over 1,000 national and local organizations united to achieve quality affordable health care for all. He was also one of the leaders of the successful campaign to stop the privatization of Social Security, called Americans United to Protect Social Security. Hickey was a founder and Communications Director of the Economic Policy Institute, a Washington think tank that looks at economics from the point of view of working Americans. He was also a founder of the Public Media Center in San Francisco. A graduate of the University of Virginia, Hickey began his career in the 1960s as an organizer for the Virginia Civil Rights Committee.

LeeAnn Hall is co-executive director of People's Action and People's Action Institute. A leader in social and racial justice organizing for more than 30 years, Hall has influenced and effected national reforms in health care, immigration policy, and fair pay. She has guided and inspired hundreds of young organizers into careers in social justice work. She was previously the founder and executive director of the Alliance for a Just Society. Hall lives in Seattle, Washington.

Isaiah J. Poole is communications director of People's Action, and has been the editor of OurFuture.org since 2007. Previously he worked for 25 years in mainstream media, most recently at Congressional Quarterly, where he covered congressional leadership and tracked major bills through Congress. Most of his journalism experience has been in Washington as both a reporter and an editor on topics ranging from presidential politics to pop culture. His work has put him at the front lines of ideological battles between progressives and conservatives. He also served as a founding member of the Washington Association of Black Journalists and the National Lesbian and Gay Journalists Association.

Jeff Bryant is an Associate Fellow at Campaign for America's Future and the editor of the Education Opportunity Network website. Prior to joining OurFuture.org he was one of the principal writers for Open Left. He owns a marketing and communications consultancy in Chapel Hill, N.C. He has written extensively about public education policy.

Miles Mogulescu is an entertainment attorney/business affairs executive, producer, political activist and writer. Professionally, he is a former senior vice president at MGM. He has been a lifelong progressive since the age of 12 when his father helped raise money for Dr. Martin Luther King, who was a guest in his home several times. More recently, he organized a program on single payer healthcare at the Take Back America Conference, a 2-day conference on Money in Politics at UCLA Law School, and “Made in Cuba,” the largest exhibition of contemporary Cuban art ever held in Southern California. He co-produced and co-directed "Union Maids," a film about three women union organizers in Chicago in the 1930s and '40s, which was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Feature Documentary.

Robert L. Borosage is the founder and president of the Institute for America’s Future and co-director of its sister organization, the Campaign for America’s Future. The organizations were launched by 100 prominent Americans to develop the policies, message and issue campaigns to help forge an enduring majority for progressive change in America.
Mr. Borosage writes widely on political, economic and national security issues. He is a Contributing Editor at The Nation magazine, and a regular blogger at The Huffington Post. His articles have appeared in The American Prospect, The Washington Post,Tthe New York Times and the Philadelphia Inquirer. He edits the Campaign’s Making Sense issues guides, and is co-editor of Taking Back America (with Katrina Vanden Heuvel) and The Next Agenda (with Roger Hickey).

About Terrance Heath

Terrance Heath is the Online Producer at Campaign for America's Future. He has consulted on blogging and social media consultant for a number of organizations and agencies. He is a prominent activist on LGBT and HIV/AIDS issues.